Buying Love in India

India’s digital revolution, which led to an unprecedented proliferation of apps, created a new and emphatic opening up of traditional ideas of love, sex and relationships. The people you will encounter in Buying Love in India capture precisely this tectonic shift in India’s dating scene, frequently felt and whispered about but never presented in narrative form. Drawn from real-life cases that Aili Seghetti witnessed while working as an intimacy and sex coach, this book is a deep dive into the innermost desires of modern Indians who are trying to make sense of a rapidly changing terrain of intimacy and pleasure.

The individuals in this book, primarily men, often find themselves lost and confused as they struggle to redefine masculinity, while failing to express their sexual and emotional needs in a healthy manner. Uncovering fundamental urges that get shrouded in puritanical secrecy and shame, Seghetti foregrounds the desires of Indian men, who seek paid encounters or emotional connection from a wide array of sexualities, relationships and desires. In telling their stories, she also encourages conversations around rampant abuse, hetero-patriarchal domination and violence, which adversely affect women, minorities and even men.

At its core, Buying Love in India speaks to the male loneliness epidemic. It is a humbling testimony to the fact that despite good sex toys, sex workers and apps, there truly is no substitute for basic human empathy and good communication.